


Silver and Slice (A Supernatural AU)

by whatkindoftea (haeli)



Series: Hunter Verse (Homin) [1]
Category: DBSK|Tohoshinki|TVXQ
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-16
Updated: 2013-04-07
Packaged: 2017-12-25 17:52:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/955983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haeli/pseuds/whatkindoftea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p> Yunho hunts, and Changmin helps.  But when a creature neither of them believed existed puts Yunho in the hospital, they both know things need to change.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

“Babe, why you got a gun shoved in the back of your jeans?”

 

Yunho almost misses the question. Most of his focus is on scanning the dim bar room for his target and ignoring the girls’s wandering hands.

 

“What?” he can hear the distraction in his voice as his eyes glance over her like she barely even exists.

 

“The gun?” she presses, wanting attention, “You worried about something?”

 

Her lacquered nails are long, chipping on the edges and the way she runs them through his hair and leans in close has Yunho nearly cringing in distaste.

 

“Everyone should be worried right now,” he responds.

 

“Are you talking about those murders?” she leans back a bit, slight pout twisting her lips, “They caught the creep that was doing it. The guy cutting all those people up and taking out their insides - they found him holed up in some shack by the highway.”

 

Unable to stifle his snort, Yunho just shakes his head at the girl practically sitting on his lap before giving the space another once over.  Earlier today, the local law enforcements had arrested a man who lived on the edge of the city.  He was probably a paranoid schizophrenic, muttering and letting his hair grow wild as he collected knives, but he wasn’t a monster.

 

One thing Yunho has learned from nearly ten years on the job is that missing hearts usually mean monsters, not psychiatric patients.  Which is why he’s here.  The entire saga reeked of the supernatural, and Yunho has spent the last few days investigating and tracking, trying to figure out what was stalking this town and what was the quickest way to kill it.

 

Usually, the easiest way to catch and kill an animal is to find the hunting ground, and even monsters will find pretty things to play with at a bar.  There’s only a few in town, and this one is the busiest.

 

Frustrated that the thing - most likely a werewolf - hasn’t shown up yet, Yunho turns a portion of his attention back to the girl whose affection he’d apparently bought with a drink.  He’d paid for it because she was pretty and reminded him of a girl he had kissed behind the school in the seventh grade.  Besides, in this town, ignoring interest of that sort would have made him look suspicious, regardless of his personal preferences.  Things were going to get weird enough tonight without being picked out as social pariah.

 

No longer interested in the gun, she’s turned her attention to hardy flannel shirt he’s wearing - real flannel, not the cheap plaid he’s seen teenagers sporting on the subways in the bigger cities.  Feigning fascination with the buttons, she starts playing with the ones near his throat, fingers grazing the skin above the collar, and only a complete fool would misinterpret her intentions.  Yunho’s been called a lot of things, but never a fool. Well, except by one person, and he doesn’t count.

 

“Look, I’m flattered and all, but this really isn’t what I’m here for,” the words are direct, not meant to hurt but make a point.

 

With a dry laugh, the girl moves back from Yunho’s personal space and turns back to the bar,  “Whatever.”

 

He feels a twinge of remorse for the girl who probably spends more than enough time with strange men, but Yunho resumes watching the door and finally sees what he’s been looking for.

 

It’s another girl, similar to the one sitting next to him.  She’s slim and pretty, but with hard edges.  She can take care of herself and does so however she wants, but that’s not why Yunho cares.

_There_ , Yunho thinks as she slinks out of the bar with a man’s arm around her waist.  Her eyes - they’re feral and glinting and catch the light like a mirror.  Yunho smirks.  Shifters, they all have the same tell and the same weaknesses; the silver bullets sitting in the clip of his Glock 19 will do for a werewolf her size.

 

Not wanting to miss this opportunity, Yunho puts down fifteen thousand won on the bar top and follows the couple out, unnoticed by the rowdy 1 AM crowd filling the room.

 

 

\---

 

He wonders for a moment whether or not the sawed-off shotgun is worth the trip back to his truck, but decides against it.  He doesn’t want to waste any time; besides, the she-wolf may have posed a problem for the locals, racking up a five person body count in the last week during the lead up to the full moon, but that many bodies in a town of just over 65,000 means she’s reckless.  And reckless usually means stupid, which in Yunho’s experience means easy to kill.

 

Instead of picking up more arms, he goes straight after the monster and her prey, drawing the concealed hand gun carefully as he makes his way down the block.  He knows the drill.  She’ll take the man off down a dark alley, and because he’s either too drunk or too desperate for a lay from the good looking girl, he won’t notice that something’s off.

 

Picking up his pace a little bit, Yunho sticks to the shadows made by the four story buildings and flickering lights that make up the town’s center, silently approaching an alley he knows will be the first place she’ll stop.   It’s less than a block from the bar, where the noise is still loud enough to hide any unfortunate sounds the man makes.

 

As Yunho rounds the corner, it only takes a moment before he realizes something’s wrong.  The girl’s standing there with the man pushed up against the wall, but nothing else looks like the werewolf attack Yunho was expecting to stop.

 

Werewolves, especially around the time of the full moon, are violent, using claws and fangs and brute strength to tear their victims apart in order to get at their hearts.  The man being held up against the wall is very much intact and looks at peace, gazing at the young woman in front of him completely untroubled by anything around him.  Or inside of him.

 

From where he’s standing, Yunho can see that the girl’s hand has disappeared inside of the man’s rib cage.  But there’s no blood and no screaming, and Yunho’s not entirely sure what he’s witnessing right now.  He wishes he had gone to get his shot gun.  With a soft death rattle, the man slides down the wall as the girl removes her hand from his chest cavity, gently clutching his heart.  Yunho anchors himself at the entrance to the alley and raises the gun, one finger on the trigger, but he’s not fast enough.

 

The girl has already seen him and pins him with her eyes.  Yunho’s been doing this for too long to get scared and freeze up; there’s something about her stare that gives it real force and power.  Yunho can feel it locking him in place, unable to turn away as she devours the man’s heart or pull the trigger to stop her.

 

Yunho begins to wonder if the silver bullets will even work. Whatever this is - it’s clearly not a werewolf.

 

She finishes with blood smeared across her lips and turns back to the body.  To Yunho’s surprise, she tears into the man’s corpse, shredding his torso and racking long gashes across his limbs, and now Yunho understands why.  These are the wounds that made him think it was a werewolf.  The monster is covering her tracks, and no one at the hospital bothered to determine which wounds were the cause of death and which ones were postmortem. It’s not the first time Yunho feels betrayed by civilians inadequately doing their jobs.

 

“It’s pretty convincing isn’t it,” she says as she faces the hunter in the alleyway.  There’s a lilt to her voice that Yunho can’t place, but she’s obviously not from around here.  Her voice is more suited to Seoul’s high society than this highway town. “Wolves are so much more common, makes it so easy to lead you astray.”

 

He feels the coiled power keeping him still unwind from his throat.  She wants him to answer, and it’s unsettling.  Monsters that play with something they’re going to kill are never good news.  It usually means cruelty and a tendency to find joy in the pain of others, and Yunho’s really not interested in any of it and so elects to stay silent.

 

Annoyance flashes across her features, but a slow smile covers it equally as fast. “Little hunter,” she taunts as she prowls towards him, something about her gait sending alarms off in Yunho’s mind.  The clever way she moves and the wildness about her seem so at odds with her soft face and petite frame. There’s a dot he’s not connecting, and he can’t figure it out. He keeps getting distracted by her eyes - they’re not just the eyes of a shifter.  They’re slitted and golden and wrong.

 

“Little hunter, I can see you trying to put it all together, make everything fit. But what do you know?” she sneers as she moves in closer, stealing into his space and wrapping a hand around his wrist still holding the gun. She brings her lips closer, nearly grazing his jaw and growls, “You don’t know anything.”

 

Still trapped and pinned Yunho can’t stop her from pulling back, flexing her hand and breaking his wrist. He feels the bones snap and the pain sear up his nerves, momentarily blinding him.

 

Fuck, he hates it when they’re sadists.

 

“Fourteen hundred years of surviving, and you think you can kill me with this metal toy?” her eyes are glinting and savage as she adds pressure to the wrist, and Yunho knows his knees would be buckling if he wasn’t being held up.  “Don’t flatter yourself; you’re a child.  You would be dead before you could scream for help if that’s what I decided.”

 

With a vicious grin, she puts her free hand on Yunho’s side and gently runs her fingers across his ribs towards his back before wrenching forward, ripping through flesh with a soft wet tear.  For a moment she’s lost in the violence of it, and reality bends around her, and through the pain Yunho sees ears and nine tails and realizes he made a terrible mistake thinking she was just a werewolf.

 

With one last smile showing off tiny sharp teeth and a dainty wave, the girl disappears down the alley in complete silence.  As she moves away, Yunho feels himself crumpling to the ground, no longer able to stay upright without whatever power the monster was using to keep him in place.

 

Trying to keep a clear head before he passes out from blood loss, Yunho attempts to stop the bleeding from his side with his flannel and reaches for his cell phone.  Chuncheon is less than half an hour away from the smaller town, and Yunho needs help fast.

 

He knows the number by heart, and doesn’t waste time scrolling through contacts.  Punching in the ten digits, Yunho pulls himself over to the wall to lean against it as he waits.

 

The phone rings twice before a groggy voice answers.

 

“You stupid fuck, what is it?” a rather irritated and scratchy voice bites out across the connection.  Yunho can’t help but smile even as his breath shortens and his vision gets a little cloudy.

 

“Changmin, I’m in Hongcheon, just off the 60.  I need your help.”  The line is quiet for a beat before Yunho can hear a flurry of activity and cursing.

 

“Where in Hongcheon?” The scratchiness is gone, but Changmin’s voice is strained, wanting more information before he’s able to center himself and take action.

 

“Downtown, a bar called Lace.” Yunho fights the dizziness knowing that if he can just tell Changmin where he is, the younger man will be here in less than thirty minutes.

 

“You stupid bastard, I’ll kill you,” Changmin snarls and Yunho can hear the sound of him slamming the door to the apartment.

 

Yunho chuckles, “You’ll have to get here and save me first.”

 

“I’m going to stay on the line with you,” Changmin’s voice has evened out, taking on a calm professional edge.  “You need to stay conscious.”

 

“I think that’s for hypothermia. I’m only bleeding. Oh, and I think my wrist is broken.”

 

“You’re going to go into shock from blood loss then.  I need you to stay awake for as long as you can.”

 

“Tell me a story,” Yunho presses, trying to ease some of the strain of the situation.

 

“Fuck off,” an engine starts in the background and Yunho knows he’ll be okay even as Changmin keeps talking.  “Put pressure on whatever it is you’re bleeding from and recite all of the herbs native to Korea that can aid in warding off _dokkaebi_.”

 

Yunho laughs and tries to ignore how faint and wet it sounds.

 

 

\---

 

Changmin managed to keep Yunho awake for most of the journey, quizzing him on boring basic hunting facts and wheedling him for information about what happened.   The best he can figure is that Yunho went after something alone, completely unprepared, and now he’s learning a lesson from it, again. The stupid bastard.

 

He makes good time - in twenty minutes he’s parking his little Honda in the first space he can find on the street Yunho described.  He bolts from the car, lugging his backpack filled with various supplies out behind him.  Yunho passed out just as he entered the town’s center, and he’s running out of time.  He sees the bar on the other side of the street and darts across the road, not worrying about the light traffic this early in the morning.

 

He sees the older man slumped against a dirty brick wall, partially hidden by shadows and alley debris, and forces a mental distance.  Yunho’s face isn’t injured, Changmin can see his features clearly even from ten meters away - small face, full mouth, sharp nose - but his coloring is wrong.  Rather than panicking over Yunho’s pallor and stillness, he lets it guide him, showing him what needs to be done to help the hunter.  Freaking out won’t make sure Yunho pulls through this.

 

Yunho is still breathing.  Changmin gets blood on his jeans as he kneels down on the ground to get a better look, and it doesn’t take long to figure out where it’s all coming from.  Pulling away the shirt-turned-tourniquet, he sees Yunho’s left side is mangled, muscle and skin torn wide open by what looks like claws.  The bleeding has slowed down, but Changmin isn’t sure if that’s due to the flannel shirt Yunho’s tied around it or because his body is slowly running out.  The wound smells and looks clean - nothing to indicate rot or infection yet - but Yunho’s color and lack of response are telling Changmin this is outside of even his more-than-basic first aid abilities.  The older man has lost too much blood, and Changmin’s not about to go prodding around the open wound to figure out whether or not any organs have been damaged.

 

“Shit.  You’re going to kill me,” Changmin groans,  already hearing Yunho’s eventual protests, but at least he’ll be alive to tear him a new one.  Now he just needs to figure out how to haul Yunho’s heavy ass to his car without drawing too much attention.  Awesome.

 

 

\---

 

The sterile white environment of the hospital grates on Yunho in a way that no other place is capable of doing.

 

“If I had wanted to go to a hospital,” he seethes at the young man standing in corner of the hospital room, “I would have called a fucking ambulance.  But I called you, Changmin.”  His anger is totally misplaced, he knows that, but he’s so mad at Changmin for bringing him here, where incompetency abounds.  Civilian doctors have no idea what they’re doing, and Yunho thought Changmin understood that.

 

“You had lost too much blood,” Changmin is quiet, not making eye contact, “I would have been able to patch you up, but you would have died within three days anyway.”

 

“Oh, suddenly the Arts and Culture student is a medical professional?” Yunho sneers from the bed, as if he didn’t know that what Changmin said was true.  Yunho heard the doctors.  He had needed over two liters of blood when he arrived; he had nearly been dead.

 

“Fuck off, Yunho,” Changmin snaps, bitter and angry as he finally looks at the injured man in the hospital bed. Changmin’s tired of the over-used argument, parroted every single time Yunho ends up in a hospital after a hunt.  It’s getting old, and he doesn’t want to hear it anymore.  Shifting from the wall to a chair at the foot of the hospital bed, Changmin slumps over before fixing Yunho with a calculating look.

 

“I told them a dog attacked you,” Changmin says, ignoring Yunho’s annoyed snort.  “How did you let a werewolf mess you up like this? It’s not like you to be that sloppy.”

 

“Because it wasn’t one, obviously,” Yunho replies, rolling his eyes.

 

“Obviously?” Changmin can’t stop his eyebrows from arching towards his too-long fringe.

 

“Like you said, I don’t mess up like this.  It wasn’t a werewolf.” Yunho trails off, looking at a spot just over Changmin’s shoulder.  He knows what he saw - the pointed ears, the nine tails - but he’s not sure Changmin will believe him.

 

“Well, if it wasn’t a werewolf, then what was it? And why did it let you go? How come you’re not missing your heart right now?”

 

“I think it was a _kumiho_ , and I have no idea why she didn’t kill me.”

 

“ _Kumiho_? The fox spirit?” Changmin’s voice is clear, making sure he hasn’t misheard anything and Yunho can see him physically fighting his surprise.

 

“Yeah.  That’s how she got the jump on me,” Yunho exhales, never comfortable talking about failure.  “I was expecting a ninety-five pound were-girl, and instead I got a real mythical fucking creature.”

 

“I think the broken wrist, skin grafts, and thirty-four stitches kind of makes it a real creature, don’t you?” Changmin jokes, but he’s coming around to the idea, the wheels of his mind turning already with possibilities and potential next moves.

 

“Shut up,” Yunho mutters, finally focusing his eyes on Changmin’s face.  “It’s been a while since I came across something I didn’t know how to kill.”

 

“I’m sure there’s something out there that can do the trick,” Changmin muses, thinking of the walls he’s turned into bookshelves back at his apartment, double stacked and over flowing with research and lore.  He’s sure there’s some factoid, some line among all of them that could be useful.  “And if it is a kumiho, then there’s no way you’re going after it alone.”

 

“Yes, I am.”

 

Changmin refocuses at the edge in Yunho’s voice.  He’s staring at Changmin from the hospital bed, immovable and determined.

 

“Yunho, you can’t keep going off on your own like this.  It’s going to get you killed,” Changmin’s replies, caught off guard by Yunho’s vehemence.

 

“Better me than someone else,” and Yunho’s eyes slide away from Changmin again, glancing down to where his hands have fisted the hospital sheets, a regretful angle to his lips.

 

Now Changmin knows what this is about, and he shouldn’t be surprised.  He can see it in every scar and tired line of Yunho’s body that’s appeared in the last eight months.  It’s what every hair-brained hunt, every late night call for help, and every quick fuck in his dark apartment has been about.  And Changmin’s had it with this conversation too.

 

“Jesus Christ, Yunho, I’m not Jitae.  You’re not going to be responsible for me.  You weren’t even  supposed to be responsible for him!”  Changmin’s composure fractures.  The exhaustion from the last fourteen hours combines with how entirely done he is with Yunho’s bullshit, and it splinters whatever outward control he had.

 

“You think I don’t know that?” Yunho is absolutely still, eyes blazing.

 

“Yeah?” The words are coming unbidden now, pouring out faster than Changmin can halt them, “Then why have you spent the better part of a year on a crusade to kill yourself? Why are you running after things left and right without someone to watch your back?”

 

“It’s none of your business!” Yunho looks truly angry now, jaw clenched and it’s amazing he managed to form words with the tension in his face.

 

Changmin almost chokes on the disbelief that rises in his throat. “When you call me in the middle of my class lectures to consult on some scrap of paper with latin writing or an archaic Chinese character, you make it my business. When you ask me to come and clean up your bloody messes at one in the morning, you make it my business.  When you stumble into my apartment at all hours of the night and crawl into my bed, it’s my business.  Yunho, you can’t keep doing this to yourself.  Jitae died because there was no way to save him.”

 

“Shut up, Changmin.”

 

“No, you need to hear this because you’ve isolated yourself from every other human being on earth, and now there’s only me left to tell you.  Grow the fuck up, Yunho,” Changmin seethes.  “You know how hard that life is.  You know that some people won’t make it out alive.  Jitae made a bad move, and it got him killed.  He knew it was dangerous when he joined up with you, just like you knew it was dangerous when you opted to hunt instead of going to college after your service.”

 

“I know, okay? It’s why I won’t bring you with me.” And just like that the rising spiral of tension and anger they had been on disappears.  Yunho slumps against the back pillows of his bed, carefully not looking at the younger man sitting near his feet.

 

“What?” Changmin stops his rant, genuinely surprised that this isn’t about Yunho’s suicide mission.

 

“I am not bringing you with me on this.  I won’t do it.” Yunho’s looking right at him now, every word concrete, unwavering.  “You’re going to school, you’re going to get a doctorate degree.  It’s one thing for you to send me an email with some attachments that help me kill the monster,  or for you to play first responder when the thing’s already dead.  It’s not the same as killing it yourself, and I’m not going to let you wander around at night thinking that you’re playing superhero.  You’re not trained.  You’re not ready for this - I’m not going to be responsible for you or get you killed. I saved you once, and I’m not putting you in a situation where I don’t know if I could do it again.”

 

Changmin sits back in his chair, aware of how far forward he shifted during the exchange.  There isn’t anything that resembles anger or resentment in Yunho’s face or posture.  There’s only a desperation for understanding in the older man, but Changmin doesn’t want to read it as anything too meaningful.

 

“Well, if that’s how you feel now, that’s fine,” Changmin hears the way is voice is muffled by his shock, “But you’re going to need to take some time to recover and that gives me about five weeks to see if I can’t change your mind.”

 

“You can’t,” Yunho believes what he says, never one to lie unnecessarily and especially never to Changmin.

 

But Changmin is just as stubborn and replies without missing a beat, “Watch me.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

It’s obvious from the moment Yunho is discharged form the hospital that he’s in no shape to hunt, let alone live on his own.  So he goes home with Changmin. That in itself isn’t odd, having shared a bed on on a number of occasions in the last three years.  But those times only lasted for a night or two and involved little talking beyond whatever case Yunho was working on, and even less outside of the bedroom.

 

This time, Yunho has no case and can barely dress himself.

 

“I’ll help you,” Changmin says, as the older man rests on the full bed, skin waxy pale from the drive back to the apartment, “Just get better.”

 

Yunho doesn’t say anything.  He closes his eyes and rolls onto his uninjured side and waits for the pain medication to pull him into sleep.

 

\---

 

It’s four o’clock in the afternoon, and Yunho slowly wakes from a nap, buried into pillows and blankets, creating a nest on the full bed he and Changmin have shared since his discharge.

 

The weeks have been a push and pull.  Yunho’s stubbornness makes it difficult for him to give up control and let the younger man care for him, and Changmin’s impatience doesn’t help the process.  They’re both learning, but every inch of progress made is hard-won.

 

With a dozy groan, he turns to see Changmin standing on the other side of the bed, jaw tight.  He can practically hear Changmin’s teeth grind through his vague haze of pain and medication.

 

“Yunho, I know you’re supposed to take it easy and heal up, but you can’t just lie around all day.  I need your help with research and planning and maybe, I don’t know, washing a plate or two.”  Changmin’s voice is flat, and Yunho knows he’s just barely reining in the desire to kick him out of bed and drag him out by the ear.

 

But the injury makes him petulant.  Yunho just turns and sticks his tongue out at Changmin, without the decency to even open his eyes while he insults the younger man.

 

Changmin sighs and gives this one up; it’s not his hill to die on.  “Fine, but it’s time to clean your stitches, you can sleep after that.” He moves to the bathroom quietly to get everything they’ll need.

 

Frustrated, Yunho calls out, “I can do it myself.” He fights and complains every time Changmin has to help him with his shirts or sutures, and every time Changmin’s answer is the same.

 

“No, you can’t, at least not yet.” The sound of water running comes from the bathroom, echoing against the linoleum, “It pulls the stitches when you twist around, and I’m not taking you back to the emergency room if you tear them again.  I’ll let you bleed out this time, maybe that’ll teach you something.”  Yunho winces.  It had been unpleasant.  He’s had injuries before, but bullet holes and burns are different than having half of your torso torn open.  Three days after he had been discharged, he had pulled too far and torn the slow healing skin open, still unused to his restricted range of movement.

 

“Move so I can get to the stitches,” Changmin’s voice echoes , carrying over the noise of a bowl being filled from the tap.

 

With a grumble, Yunho carefully adjust to lying on his back, the movements still stiff.  There are two more bangs of cupboard doors and then Changmin is joining him.  The bed creaks under the added weight as the younger man situates himself to Yunho’s left, carefully balancing the bowl of warm water in the space between his knees.

 

Yunho pull his arm up to his chest, wincing against the pull as he grasps the opposite shoulder.  Changmin takes a moment to look at the injury, not touching yet, but Yunho feels his gaze prick at his skin, making him feel flustered and over-heated.

 

“They look a lot better today,” Changmin comments, wetting the cloth and adding a bit of soap, “the redness has gone down.”

 

“They feel better,” Yunho keeps his eyes closed and arm tucked, trying to give Changmin room to work.   He feels exhaustion pull at him behind his eyes.

 

Slowly, with extreme care, Changmin dabs at the wounds.  It won’t necessarily help anything heal faster or better.  The skin is mending, but even with the stitches and grafts, the left side of his body will be mottled with scars - more to add to his impressive collection.  But it helps with the itching, and Yunho feels some of the tension leave his muscles at the reassuring sensation.

 

Silence falls between them.

 

Yunho is hyperaware of each of Changmin’s movements, just as he knows Changmin is watching his face for any indication of discomfort. Yunho tries to lie still and let Changmin work.

 

He can hear Changmin’s soft breaths, slow and drawn through his nose.  Yunho takes one of his own and sinks into the moment, letting his guard down and allowing Changmin to take care of him.

 

Yunho hates the word “intimate.”  It’s nostalgic and romantic, things he’s never had the time to care for, but it’s all he can think of as Changmin’s hands sooth him and guide him while he recovers.

 

Yunho knows he’s stubborn, closed-off, and rash, but he’s also resourceful and loyal and determined.  Changmin rages at him for leaving towels and gauze everywhere, a trail of mess and disorganization his wake, but he’s found himself trying to make up for it by putting left over food in containers for Changmin to take to campus and making green tea for when he gets back from late lectures.

 

Their relationship, or whatever it is, used to be about convenience and familiarity, powered by electricity between them.  Now, not as much.

 

It takes a minute before he realizes that Changmin has stopped.  Blinking slowly, Yunho tilts his head until their eyes meet and feels his breath freeze in his lungs at the open and honest gaze.  Changmin opens his mouth and wets his lips.

 

Yunho tenses, knowing that things have become fraught with more meaning and depth over the last weeks, but doesn’t want to deal with it. Not yet.  He hopes Changmin doesn’t make him, please, not right now.

 

He’s saved.

 

“I have that evening lecture.” Changmin’s voice is horse and sabotaged.  “I should get going.”

 

“Okay.” Yunho closes his eyes again and moves his arm from his chest, adjusting for comfort.

 

“Yeah,” Changmin says, and Yunho can hear the disappointment in the voice, even if he’s not sure who it’s meant for. “I guess I’ll see you later.”  Yunho doesn’t answer, shutting his eyes and willing more sleep to come.

 

The bead groans again and Changmin cautiously removes himself, dumping the bowl and soapy water into the shower with more clatter and bangs than necessary.  The frustration is mutual, and Yunho knows that it’s only a matter of time now.

 

\---

 

The days drag on and Yunho gets better. He gains back motion and independence.  Soon, they turn to the _kumiho_.  But there are too many questions, with too few leads and too many dead ends and soon they find themselves sitting in a mountain of useless information.

 

One question does eventually get answered.

 

“I think I know why you got away,” Changmin announces in the middle of a Saturday afternoon.  Yunho is lounging on the couch, a dense anthology of Korean folk lore on his lap.

 

Changmin thrusts a copy of Science Magazine under his nose.  The title is something about the functionality of emotions, and Yunho has no clue what this has to do with the _kumiho_.

 

“I don’t get it.” He looks up at the taller man, who huffs and takes a seat next to him on the couch, pointing excitedly at the article.

 

“It’s a meta-review about current psychology research on emotions.”

 

Yunho’s not sure if Changmin believes that’s a sufficient explanation because it doesn’t help at all.  He gives Changmin an amused look before responding, “Of course it is.”

 

“Shut up,” Changmin does a little wiggly move in his seat and Yunho knows he’s gearing up for a lecture.  “The functional perspective of emotion’s research claims that each emotion is an evolutionary response, a package of survival techniques that help the individual in different situations.”

 

“Okay,” Yunho draws the word out, making it clear he’s not quite there yet.

 

“So, the key is contentment.” Changmin looks really pleased with himself, and Yunho wishes he could share in his joy.

 

“What does this have to do with the _kumiho_?”

 

“Well,” Changmin snatches the magazine out of his hands and flips to a page with a weird diagram of a rat in a maze, “a _kumiho_ is essentially a really old fox right?  So I think it’s safe to assume that it still follows similar behavioral patterns.”

 

He pushes the magazine back at Yunho, who takes it with some reticence.

 

Changmin points at a picture of a sleeping mouse on the page opposite to the maze diagram. “Contentment is what happens after you eat.  That warm feeling you get, and you just want to curl up into a ball on the couch and snooze?” Yunho’s familiar with the sensation and nods along.

 

Changmin grins.  “You want to go somewhere safe and quiet because you’re vulnerable since all of your blood is going to your organs to help you digest.  You can’t really run or fight very well on a full stomach.  And that’s why she let you go.  She had just eaten, so she needed to go somewhere safe where she could digest!”

 

“Why didn’t she just kill me?  I was pretty much helpless.” Yunho closes the magazine and tosses it on the ground, not totally satisfied with the explanation.

 

Changmin thinks for a moment before he pulls the anthology away from Yunho, grazing his injured side in the process.

 

“Oops,” he flicks his gaze to Yunho’s face when he gasps at the brief contact, “my bad.” Yunho notes he doesn’t sound terribly sorry, and gingerly checks the injury.

 

“Well, I’m not entirely sure about that,” he flicks through the well worn pages describing the fox spirit, thoughtful quirk to his lips.  “It probably has something to do with not wanting to waste a heart.  But we can always ask Kyuhyun and Zhou Mi, right?”

 

Yunho nods, thinking about the hunters in China.  “Most Korean myths originate in China.” He shrugs, unable to think of a reason why they shouldn’t ask.

 

“Okay, I’ll shoot Kyuhyun an email or something to ask if they’ve got a moment.” Changmin rises from the couch, stretching up and out, shoulders popping.  “I’m going to get some tea,” he looks down at Yunho, “do you want any?”

 

Yunho notes the tired circles under Changmin’s eyes.  Progress on the case has been slow.  The unravelling of even the small mystery of Yunho’s escape is a triumph, and Changmin looks more relaxed than he has in weeks.

 

“Tea would be great,” he smiles and reaches for the anthology once again, it’s weight reassuring in his hands as he watches Changmin wander over to the tiny kitchenette about five feet away.

 

He keeps watching as Changmin goes through the motions of boiling water and gathering leaves and mugs.  Yunho smiles at the sight of Changmin carefully measuring out the loose leaves into metal infusers.  He had once asked why a poor college student spent so much money on fresh tea when the bags were so much cheaper.

 

“There are few enough good things in the world,” Changmin had responded, smiling but serious, “and really excellent tea is one of them.”

 

He’s pulled from his thoughts by Changmin’s voice.

 

“We’ll have to track her down again eventually.  You know that right?”

 

“There’s no ‘we’ in this, Changmin.” Yunho sighs, knowing the conversation was going to come up eventually.

 

“Don’t be stupid,” Changmin says mildly, turning back to the boiling kettle to pour the hot water into two mismatched mugs.  “You’re no good working alone.”

 

“Really,” Yunho deadpans raising his eyebrows at the younger man as he makes his way back to the couch carefully holding the two steaming mugs.

 

“Yunho,” Changmin hands him his mug with a soft exhale, shoulders slumping as he sits back down.  “You can’t do this alone.” Yunho opens his mouth to deny it, butChangmin holds up his hand.  “I’m not just talking about this case.” He waves his hand in an encompassing gesture, “I’m talking about hunting, about everything.”

 

“I’ve been doing this for a long time.” The implication that he’s not capable stings, especially coming from Changmin.

 

“I know,” Changmin takes a sip of his tea and swallows slowly.  “And I know that you’re one of the best, but if you don’t get another hunting partner, you are going to get yourself killed and there’s no way around it.”

 

Yunho stares into his mug, watching the dense flavoring near the diffuser float and drift out, coloring the rest of the water slowly.

 

“It’s amazing you survived these last eight months.” Changmin’s voice has gone quiet, a hint of appeal in his tone, “You won’t survive another attack like this one, and you won’t be able to avoid it if you carry on like you have been.”

 

Yunho knows it’s true.  He’s closing in on thirty and his body has been ground down and beaten and broken more times than he can count.  He knows, but he doesn’t want to listen because there’s only one alternative to going alone and he won’t accept it.

 

“You don’t have time to find someone else, and you know it.”

 

“I can’t,” Yunho mutters, staring resolutely at his mug.  He refuses to look at Changmin, refuses to see the earnestness, “I’m not ready to be responsible for someone else again.”

 

“Yunho,” Changmin’s stare is insistent, burning with its ardor, “what happened? What happened with Jitae?”

 

Yunho can’t answer right away, feeling the guilt and helplessness press him into the sofa.  He clutches at the mug of oolong and takes a careful sip letting the earthy green flavor run over his tongue and wash the bitterness from his mouth before he can start speaking.

 

“We were going after a litobora, a poison demon.” He has to clear his throat before he can continue.  “They don’t usually come out this far west. Mostly they stick to the central Pacific Ocean on tiny islands with small populations that they can feed off of steadily and kill slowly.  I still don’t understand how it got all the way to Kijang.”

 

Changmin stills, placing his own mug carefully on the tiny table in front of the sofa.  Yunho can feel the intensity of his gaze and anticipation crackle through the air.

 

“Anyway,” Yunho starts again, his voice slow and effortful.  “It was poisoning the water.  It was making people sick - mostly kids and the elderly.  Jitae and I got a hold of a cleansing spell from a shaman that was supposed to be powerful enough to take care of it.

 

“The spell was powerful enough, but we didn’t realize it worked in two stages because neither of us actually understood Goguryeo.  It’s so old, even you would have a hard time with it, Changmin.” Yunho smiles, plays with the hem of his sweatpants to keep his hands busy.  “Anyway, the first stage draws the demon from the water and forces it into corporeal form.  The second stage cleanses the water by destroying the creature while it’s trapped in its physical body.  It hadn’t been in the area too long, so we needed to act fast before its poison got into the ground water and did irreparable damage.

 

He takes another sip of tea and clears his throat, glancing away from Changmin’s open stare.  The younger man is still and waits for him to go on.  “We should have been paying closer attention to the magic we were using, but we’d been working together for so long.  Everything always felt easy; we thought we could handle it.  I mean, the thing had traveled hundreds of miles by sea, it should have been falling apart all on its own. We should have known better. Things that are diseased and poisoned are so much harder to kill because they’re rotting already.” Changmin makes a small noise in the back of his throat and reaches forward into the space between them.  Fingers brush his knee, but Yunho ignores it.

 

“Everything went wrong when the litobora was forced onto the shore, in the small cove where we were casting the spell.  We weren’t expecting it, and it only needed a moment to get to us.” Yunho chokes out a dry laugh, “Who knew poison demons could move so quickly?

 

“I was reading the incantation, so Jitae noticed it first.  It didn’t really matter though, the demon had its fingers around his throat before he could even inhale to call out.  And I couldn’t do anything until I had finished.

 

“By the time the spell was complete and the litobora was dead, Jitae...” Yunho stops to take a steadying breath, air shuddering on its way in. “Jitae was in rough shape. He was vomiting and hallucinating from the pain, and that was only the damage I could see.  I couldn’t think of anything except to take him to a hospital.”

 

He stops again, and looks at Changmin.  “Most of the people who got sick in Kijang eventually got better - the poison was a low enough concentration that their bodieswere able to fight it off with a few days in the hospital. A couple of days with uncontaminated water was all it took.  But Jitae,” he exhales slowly, “Jitae was consumed.  The poison was eating his blood, rotting him from the inside out.”

 

Changmin inhales sharply through his nose.  Yunho catches the brightness of his eyes and feels a little bit of weight ease from his chest.  Changmin cares, he wants to know.  “The doctors thought it was heavy metal toxicity.  ‘Iron,’ they said, ‘he has iron poisoning’, and they were going to have to have to start chelation therapy before he went into shock and his organs failed.” Yunho laughs, throat dry and scratching.  “But here’s the problem: you can’t try to counter something that old and that evil by breaking it down in the body.  Modern medicine has,” he searches for the word, “complicated reactions to the demonic and the ancient.

 

“I tried to tell the doctors that he was allergic to whatever the fuck they were going to do, anything to stop them from pumping him full of chemicals because I was pretty sure it would kill him, but they wouldn’t listen to me.  They had never heard of an allergy to the synthetic chemical before that.” Yunho’s voice is clipped and cold with bitterness, his hands hurt where they’ve been clasping the ceramic mug too tightly, “Why would I know better than them how to help Jitae?  So they administered the treatment anyway.”

 

“Yunho,” Changmin finally reaches and hooks their fingers together, relaxing Yunho’s grip, “you couldn’t have known.”

 

Yunho won’t let himself be defended.  “But I should have.  I looked it up afterward.  Chelation therapy is supposed to break down the toxins down, but Jitae didn’t have iron poisoning, and you can’t just break down the poison of a demon into something inactive.  Instead, the poison in his body altered the chemicals used in the treatment.”

 

“The doctors said something about hypocalcaemia and unforeseen complications, I don’t really remember exactly.  But it was bullshit they made up to make themselves feel better because no one could explain why his blood was black and why his heart stopped beating.”

 

The retching noises were ghastly, tearing sounds. Each strangled exhale forcing blood out of Jitae’s mouth and nose.  The memory is loud in Yunho’s mind as he relives it again for Changmin’s benefit.

 

Yunho feels grief and guilt grip his throat, holding tight.  “It was awful.  He was in so much pain, and I couldn’t help.  Couldn’t do anything but watch.  I had to watch my friend die, Changmin.” His hands twitch and he wants to throw his mug full of tea against the wall for emphasis.  “And now you want me to do the same thing with you?”

 

Silence falls, Yunho’s confession lying heavily.  He feels light-headed and sick.  He knows how easy it would be for Changmin to end up like Jitae, wrecked and snapped into bits and pieces too small to bury.

 

“Look, Changmin, you don’t want this life, you don’t want me.” Yunho breathes out, pulling his hand away.  He leans back against the arm of the couch, putting distance between them.

 

“You’re being ridiculous,” Changmin reaches out once again, “I know what I want.”

 

“No, Changmin,” Yunho’s shutters himself, gaze closed off and flat, and he can see the distance in his stare stab at Changmin.  The younger man withdraws his hand, movement harsh and jerky like Yunho had pricked it with a needle.  “You were seventeen, and I never thought about anyone but myself.  I never should have let myself have you, I shouldn’t have brought you into this.”

 

“What are you talking about?”  The sick feeling intensifies, and Yunho blinks his eyes shut to block out the lingering affection in Changmin’s voice. “You couldn’t have made me do anything I didn’t want to do,” Changmin insists, not letting it go.

 

“Just because I didn’t force you, doesn’t mean I wasn’t selfish.” There’s enough self-hatred in Yunho’s voice to still Changmin’s stuttering protests, and he continues, “This life - going into the darkest places to find the worst nightmares - it does things to your sense of time.  It’s like you never know if there’ll be enough of it.  It makes you greedy and empty all at once, and all you can do is try to fill it up. And that’s what I did with you.”

 

“What the hell are you talking about?”

 

“After everything that happened with your house and the poltergeist, I took whatever I could get from you, thinking I’d die the next weekend anyway, but it turned out that I got to live again and again and again.” Yunho’s not sure how Jitae’s death bled into this, but he hasn’t been able to untangle his mess of emotions in years, and Changmin should know this too.

 

“I never forgot you,” Yunho admits, “so when I saw you at the University three years ago, I couldn’t believe it.  It should have been enough to know that you were thriving, but when is anything ever enough for me? You’re magnetic, Changmin, and I couldn’t stop myself.  I found you in the library and asked for your help and dragged you back down to me.”

 

“So,” Changmin is trying to wrap his head around this confession, “you think you... what? Imprinted on me? Psychologically maladjusted me? Yunho, I need you to hear how stupid that sounds!”

 

“But it’s not stupid!” Yunho can’t understand why Changmin isn’t hearing him, why he can’t see that Yunho has pretty much ruined his entire personal life and is on the brink of ruining his professional academic one too, that everything he has worked for is over the second he steps into Yunho’s world.  “I don’t want to do this to you anymore.  I don’t want you to be waiting around until I just never come back. You’re going to waste all of this time and potential on someone like me, and I won’t let that happen.”

 

“You know that I want to do more than just wait around here to help when you need it, but you’re the one who’s stopping us from having something better.”   Changmin’s hands have twisted into the bottom of his shirt, and he’s leaning towards Yunho, body language pleading for Yunho to pay attention. “Look, I’m not seventeen anymore, I’m not overwhelmed and freaked out.  I’ve done my military service, I know my way around a shot gun, I’ve been taking taekwondo for the past five years, and I’m smart.  I don’t know if you knew that, but I’m really fucking smart and I think that sometimes you could do with a little bit more of it.”

 

“Changmin -” Yunho can feel his conviction slide away in the face of Changmin’s own.

 

“No,” the word is harsh, pulled from the younger man by desperation.  Changmin won’t let him talk himself out of something that they both want, something that could be fantastic. “Yunho, this might surprise you, but I’m an adult.  I have a mind of my own, and I can make my own decisions.  And you want to take that away from me.  You want to reduce me to a terror I experienced when I was a teenager, and if you do that, you make me weak.  And I won’t let you do that, not to me.”

 

Changmin’s anger shifts something between them, and Yunho begins to see Changmin differently, not as the teenager with the big eyes and shy expression, but the competent graduate student who’s grown into his face with cheekbones sharp like glass. And it’s stunning.  He sees success - a story with a happy ending, and it’s so much better than what he sees when he looks in the mirror.  And that’s the real issue.  He sees himself painted rough with scars and horrors that only people broken like him can really endure, and he’s been trying to keep Changmin from becoming just another body riddled with nightmares.

 

“I don’t want you to be like me,” Yunho admits.

 

“Why?” Changmin pushes him, not backing down, “What’s so wrong with you?”

 

“I tend to break things.  And people.”

 

“People are fragile, it’s not your fault.”

 

“What I do, it’s all just darkness,” Yunho’s hands twitch where they’re resting in his lap, and he’s not sure if he wants to push Changmin away or haul him close anymore.

 

“Darkness is everywhere,” Changmin’s voice is steady as he reaches out to gently wrap his fingers around one of Yunho’s wrists, “It’s not going to make me any less safe just because I know it’s there.”

 

Yunho makes a desperate noise in the back of his throat, but doesn’t wrench away.

 

“Yunho,” Changmin brushes his thumb over his pulse point, rhythmic and reassuring, “why is this about me becoming you?  Why don’t you believe that this is what I want?”

 

“Because I don’t understand how anybody could possibly want something as ruined as me,” he admits, voice hushed and eyes wide as he watches the younger man.

 

“Yunho,” Changmin smiles, eyes crinkling, “you’re little wrinkled, but not ruined.”

 

Yunho laughs at that, more of a choked exhale, but the tension is easing and both men can breathe again.

 

Changmin takes Yunho’s mug, tea cold and bitter from over steeping.  “I’m going to send Kyu that email, then we are going to bed.”

 

Yunho’s limbs are heavy and his head feels weighed down, and he wants nothing more than to crawl under covers and into Changmin’s arms and sleep until he’s bedsore.

 

\---

 

Kyuhyun responds the next day, letting Changmin know that he and Zhou Mi will be able to video chat with them in about eight days.

 

The interim is spent researching and working out a compromise.

 

“You can help with this,” Yunho finally cedes, unhappy about having to give any ground.  He knows that things need to change between Changmin and himself, but he’s not ready to entertain the thought of Changmin becoming a full time hunter.  He’s not entirely sure Changmin understands what that entails, so he thinks a trial run will make them both equally unsatisfied.

 

“Fine,” Changmin huffs, glancing at him over his bowl of ramen.  “But I want it to be a trial run.  If I help, if this works, then I want to be able to go with you again.”

 

It’s not what Yunho wants, but he doesn’t see a way to deny Changmin.  He nods and ignores the shit-eating grin that spreads across Changmin’s face, eyes bright with triumph.

 

\---

 

With his side almost back to normal, some things go back to normal.  He starts going for runs in the morning again, the cool air burning new life into him as he slowly builds up endurance and strength.  Four days after he starts running again, he's roused from the gray static of almost sleep one night by Changmin slicking him up and working him into hardness, long legs straddling his hips, then there's spine-bending heat and the sound of Changmin's moans.  He's missed this, missed the intensity and the need and the closeness, and they go for two more messy, fantastic rounds.

 

But going three rounds makes it hard to wake up at five in the morning.

 

“Get the fuck over here,” Changmin yanks the end of the quilt, pulling it off Yunho’s curled up form.  The Yunho-lump makes a pathetic whining noise, and Changmin hides a grin as he boots up his laptop.

 

“I’ve had this Skype date set up for over a week, and you need to be here for it.”

 

Yunho groans and opens one eye to plead with Changmin, “You’re smart.  You do it.”

 

“Thank you for the compliment, but no.  Get your nicely healing self over here, so you can ask intelligent questions, since you’re the only one of us who has actually seen the _kumiho_.”

 

With a frustrated noise, Yunho unfurls himself and rolls to the foot of the bed, sitting on the corner, just behind Changmin’s left shoulder within shot of the computer’s webcam.

 

“Why did it take them so long to respond to you?”

 

“They were hunting in north _Hēilóngjiāng_ Province, a _kūn_ had been killing the local fish and the local economy.”

 

“Mmmm... Sounds cold.”

 

“It was goddamn freezing okay,”  Kyuhyun’s face, now filling the screen, complains through the laptop speakers.

 

“It wasn’t that bad” Zhou Mi can be heard admonishing from somewhere off screen, “it was only October.”  The contortion act Kyuhyun performs with his mouth indicates he disagrees with his partner.

 

“Well I’m glad you guys made it back!” Changmin cuts in before the other two hunters can find their stride and turn this into a bickering match instead of helping out with the case.

 

“Me too,” Kyuhyun shoots a death glare at Zhou Mi who has just settled into a chair next to him. “But we hear you have a problem?”

 

Yunho nods from his spot on the bed. “Yeah, there’s _kumiho_ in the area, had a bit of a run in a few weeks ago.”

 

Changmin throws a disparaging glance over his shoulder before turning back to the camera. “That’s a bit of an understatement.” Kyuhyun snickers.

 

“A _húli jīng_ ,” Zhou Mi interjects, wandering out of the screen and returning with a book, a copy of the _Shānhǎi Jīng_ , the classic text heavy with myths, and finds the page about fox spirits as he sits back down next to his partner.

 

“So far this is what we’ve got,” Changmin pulls up a note document on the computer, “a _kumiho_ is a fox who has survived for a thousand years and gains the ability to shape shift.  They need to eat one thousand hearts in order to become fully human.” He pauses and looks back to the two hunters in China, waiting for them to chime in.  Yunho scoots closer to the edge of the bed.

 

Zhou Mi nods slowly, finger running across a page dense with characters.  “Even though this version of the spirit makes no mention of age, it’s still all about the energy.  I’m not convinced it’s to become human.  It might just be how they survive.”

 

“Yeah we’d figured that part out,” Yunho can still see the man’s crumpled body at the monster’s feed as she tore into his heart.  “But what we don’t know is how to kill it, which is probably the more important part.  We need to stop it by the next full moon.”

 

“Give me a couple of days,” Zhou Mi mutters, “I think we’ll be able to come up with something.”

 

“Okay,” Yunho scrubs his hand through his hair, mind flicking through dates and lunar calendars, “but you only have three.  The full moon is in seven, and we need to be ready. I don’t want the pattern to change.”

 

“No problem,” Kyuhyun smiles, “just get your gear ready and lend us your boyfriend’s big brain, and you’ll be good to go.”

 

Yunho wants to argue the use of the word, but he catches the pleased look on Changmin’s face and the way his eyes slide to meet his and just tells them all to get on with it.

 


	3. Chapter 3

 

Yunho hates waiting.

 

His truck sits across the street from a bar in Sokcho on the night of another full moon. It hangs looming and bright in the clear sky, illuminating the road and the storefronts. Long languid shadows stretch from corners the moonlight can’t reach, and Yunho checks his Browning .22 one more time, counting out three extra bullets modified with silver.

 

A local shop owner and a couple of tourists admiring the beauty of Yeongrangho Lake turned up dead during the last week with no real explanation, but some are guessing animal attacks. Too similar to ignore, he and Changmin packed their bags with little fanfare.

 

Yunho shifts in the driver’s seat and tries to ignore the itching restlessness under his skin, keeping his eyes trained on the bar entrance and waiting for Changmin’s lithe figure to emerge from the dim doorway.

 

The plan Kyuhyun and Changmin had put together had been straightforward and entirely executable. Yunho hated it.

 

“Nope, no way,” he had glared at Changmin back at the apartnment, hands stilling over the pot of simmering noodles he’d been cooking while Changmin and Kyuhyun talked.

 

“Yunho,” Changmin pressed, voice tight, “this is the only way to get her. She knows your face, she has your scent.”

 

“But you’re bait,” Yunho ground the word out, disliking the way it sat on his tongue and echoed in the tiny kitchen. Being bait has a way of working out a lot like it sounds - messy with an unhappy ending, caught on something sharp.

 

“Yes, Yunho,” Changmin jostled him to the side as he grabbed a spoon to stir the food, unsticking noodles from the bottom of the pot, “I’m bait.” He carefully lifted and separated the cooking ramen, pointedly ignoring Yunho’s gaze. Neither of them moved until the food was done.

 

As he dished out the spicy dinner, Changmin gave Yunho a smile. It wanted to be casual and airy, but fear pulled the corners tight and gave him away. The thought scared him too.

 

“Just make sure you don’t miss,” he said, handing Yunho a bowl, some of the liquid spilling over the brim, scalding Yunho’s hand. The sting was lost in the cold stabs of anxiety pricking at this skin like tacks.

 

The four-hour drive to the north lying city had been silent except for the radio crackling insipid pop lyrics, but it was still better than the hushed tension threatening to drive Yunho mad. Changmin had barely flinched at his role to play. He sent emails to professors claiming a family emergency to excuse his absence over the next three days, and dropped everything to climb into Yunho’s beaten truck with a ratty duffle bag, pistol at the bottom..

 

It shouldn’t have been that easy, but Yunho keeps his mouth shut and pushes the truck to fifteen kilometers above the speed limit.

 

Now, after one night and a full day of scouting, Yunho can only play with his gun and twiddle his thumbs uselessly while Changmin dangles himself in front of a hungry and cunning creature, who only wants to tear his heart out.

 

Yunho slouches in the driver’s seat until his spine curves uncomfortably, and it distracts him for a moment from the nagging worry slick through his mind as he carries on with his watch.

 

\---

 

Changmin feels ridiculous - trussed up in slim black jeans and hair carefully molded into an actual style. Nervously, he runs his hands through the waxed strands, feeling them fall back into constructed disarray. Yunho had given him a pair of worn black combat boots that edge the outfit, ensemble topped with a fashionably faded t-shirt stretched across shoulders, inviting attention to the long lean lines of his body.

 

Attention he’s not entirely sure what to do with while he waits for their target - he really should think of a better word given his situation - to show herself. He shyly turns aside a comfortingly normal college girl who had spent five minutes trying to get him to sit with her and her friends. As she navigates the crowded room back to a table, he’s thankful for his height, the extra centimeters giving him a vantage to scout the crowded bar.

 

It’s warm inside given the late fall night. Loud laughter and the cloying scents of perfume and aftershave intermingle with the sharpness of alcohol as locals and a few visitors from the bigger cities crowd in together to drink and wait for the band promised to take the stage in an hour’s time. Changmin has never been a fan of folk-infused punk. He would rather take his chances with the kumiho, silently hoping she turns up before the local act can begin their set.

 

He’s not sure how he feels when he gets his wish.

 

His first impression is that she’s deadly. People move instinctually out of her way, not touching the petite woman but drinking her in with their eyes. Long hair brushes past shoulder blades, the natural black shining in the bar’s light, reflective just like her eyes. Eyes latched onto Changmin.

 

He attempts to stamp out the dread seeded somewhere near his stomach as she moves closer, her steps artful and threatening in high heeled shoes. He’s spectacularly unsuccessful, and the unease settles heavy and uncomfortable. She’s beautiful like an oleander flower. Everything about her is fresh seduction and soft petals, but tempered by a talent for death. Changmin takes a slow breath through his nose and returns her gaze as best he can without giving into the urge to run. He clutches his drink tighter as fear irritates his palms with sweat.

 

She stops next to him, flicking a finger toward the bartender to snag his attention, and Changmin’s struck by how their height difference doesn’t seem to matter. She exudes control and dominance, and Changmin knows she could tower over him even as he tilts his head down to look at her.

 

He smiles when she looks at him, trying to match her confidence. All he needs to do is make sure she picks him tonight. He needs to be the one lead into a dark street.

 

He takes another drink from his beer and adds a little leer at the end of the grin, encouraging the image of a man looking for a quick hook up.

 

She returns his smile, delight sparking her golden eyes, and slides her hand to rest on his thigh.

 

“Waiting for someone?” her voice is deeper than Changmin expected, more mature.

 

Changmin leans forward, resting into her space, “Not anymore.” She laughs, amused, and licks her lips.

 

\---

 

Yunho feels sick with anticipation, and his legs are starting to cramp from sitting in the truck for three hours. Concern and anxiety are a potent combination, and the moonlight pulls his nerves taut as the spun-out shadows tease him. Each time the bar door opens, he rockets upright in the front seat, looking for two familiar faces. So far he’s rapped his knee on the steering wheel four times. He hopes he has a bruise to show for it in the morning.

 

He needs to calm down. He starts reciting exorcisms in his head, the latin chants rhythmic and settling, and it helps time pass more smoothly until they finally emerge.

 

It’s the moment he’s been anticipating, but Yunho’s still not entirely prepared to watch as Changmin’s lead out of the discrete bar. The woman pulling him along barely reaches his shoulder, but Yunho knows she could kill the young man between heartbeats.

 

He takes a steadying breath and counts to eight, flexing his fingers around the hand gun lying resting on his thigh, before dropping out of the truck as quietly as the fifteen year old steel and iron allow.

 

She doesn’t seem to notice their tail, and if Changmin does, he keeps his attention on the girl, stumbling slightly and giggling, playing up the intoxication. Yunho hopes the kumiho can’t hear the brittle edge to the voice as well as he can.

 

He follows at a distance, keeping them in his sights and hiding in the shadows. He sends up a prayer that Kyuhyun and Zhou Mi’s research proves right, that she’ll be too focused on the hunt, on Changmin, to notice Yunho at the periphery. As long as he keeps apart, doesn’t get too close. He trails the pair, and the theory seems to hold up. She has an arm around Changmin’s middle, directing him alongside her.

 

Déjà vu doesn’t accurately describe the sensation Yunho experiences as he watches the kumiho lead Changmin down an alley. It looks similar to last time, but it feels entirely different. Fear clutches at the base of his skull as she tugs Changmin into the darkness behind her, and they disappear from Yunho’s line of sight. He runs as quietly as he can to catch up, the worked leather of his boots landing softly in the dull buzz of the town’s center.

 

The plan is simple. Beneath all the magic and violence, a kumiho is a fox, so it holds she should die like one. The four hunters suspect that a silver bullet at the exact moment she begins to feed should do the trick. It will need to pierce her heart when precisely she begins to reach for Changmin’s.

 

Yunho will need to be quick, and Changmin will need to be even quicker. The .22 caliber pistol weighs down Yunho’s hand as he reaches the alley. The bullet will be moving fast, and there isn’t a whole lot of flesh to the kumiho’s human form.

 

He hovers in the dark entry to the narrow side street. She has Changmin pressed close against a bare brick wall, her nose hovering near the base of his collarbone. She closes her eyes in triumph, and Changmin uses the moment to catch Yunho’s gaze over her head.

 

The large brown eyes staring at him look wet, and Yunho clutches his gun tighter as Changmin’s mouth parts in a silent plea. The boy is terrified, and it tugs at Yunho. But he’s going to have to wait a little longer.

 

The kumiho pulls back to focus on Changmin’s face, and he looks back at her. The skittish tension in his muscles relaxes slightly as she slowly strokes her hand up to his face, holding his eyes with her own as she drags fingers over his throat. He’s lost to her charm and doesn’t react to the touch, just continues to stare vaguely but contentedly even as her hand comes to rest over his heart.

 

Her nails begin to sink into the skin beneath them, and a switch flicks in Yunho’s brain. This is the part of the job that Yunho lives for - the shift from nervous to brief horror, then the pitch forward into intoxicating adrenaline that comes with closing in on a kill. It’s addictive. But this time the horror lingers with Changmin standing so close. It twists the high into something sharp and metallic, less like sex and more like plummeting.

 

She presses her hands harder and her nails disappear, spots of blood blooming across Changmin’s shirt. Changmin’s breath shudders out of him, and he relaxes further, peaceful by the kumiho’s will.

 

Silence settles, and Yunho knows. He explodes out of the shadows with practiced fluidity bought by years and years of hunting. It takes only seconds for him to settle himself directly behind the kumiho and take aim with the .22. Yunho exhales to steady his hands and then pulls the trigger before the monster can so much as turn her head.

 

The dry pop of the bullet jars the alleyway, knocking the air apart as the silver finds its target. The kumiho slumps forward as the bullet pierces her heart. Yunho had expected a wail, a shriek, but she only gasps wetly once, twice, then nothing, her body sliding quietly to the grotty street.

 

The loudest noise comes from Changmin.

 

Shit, Yunho thinks as he rushes to the younger man. He pushes the slight frame of the kumiho impatiently out of the way, catching Changmin as the younger begins to slide down the wall, and gently helps him to the ground. The cuts on his chest are shallow, red spots not growing on the heather gray t-shirt.

 

“Oh, fuck,” Changmin chokes on a sob as he presses his hand hard against his side, where blood smears between fingers and runs over his hand.

 

Yunho is briefly relieved to see that Changmin had managed to twist at the last minute, saving vital organs from the path of the bullet that had gone through the body at his feet. But there’s still blood seeping from just below his ribs.

 

“Changmin,” Yunho pulls at the younger man’s hand, trying to look at the injury to assess the damage, but Changmin’s shaking and won’t let him. “Changmin, you need to let me see,” he grabs hold Changmin’s face, forcing the younger man to look away from the blood.

 

“It’s going to be alright.” The bleeding is steady, but it’s not gushing, which Yunho takes as a good sign.

 

“It hurts,” Changmin’s eyes are wide and hysterical as he searches Yunho’s own, and Yunho remembers that this is the first time Changmin has been on the other side of a bullet wound.

 

“You need to let me see it,” Yunho pleads, softening the edge of his voice, thumb running over a wet cheekbone. His heart is hammering in his chest, the adrenaline of the kill giving everything a surreal quality that he’s trying to push away, push down, to help the younger man.

 

Slowly, Changmin removes his hand, now slick with blood, and wraps it tightly around Yunho’s wrist.

 

Yunho quickly presses a kiss to Changmin’s forehead, trying to reassure himself as much as Changmin before moving Changmin’s hands to settle on his shoulders and looks to see how bad it is.

 

There’s no exit wound, and Yunho curses softly. But the bullet was traveling much slower when it hit Changmin, so he’s not surprised.

 

“What is it?” Changmin asks, voice tight, and he moves his hand from where it’s clutching Yunho’s shoulder to touch the injury again.

 

Yunho catches him by the wrist and returns it, letting Changmin fist the material of his shirt instead.

 

“The bullet’s still in there,” he tells him, “but that’s the worst. No bone, no organs. Just tissue,” he looks up into Changmin’s pale face to give him what he hopes is a reassuring smile, “It’s shallow. I can fix you up back at the guesthouse.”

 

“No,” Changmin shakes his head impatiently, pitch climbing, “I want to go to the hospital. I want to make sure it’ll heal right.”

 

Changmin’s trembling and and in pain, but Yunho’s taken aback at the lack of trust. It stings, and he feels irritation curdle in his chest.

 

“I can’t take you to a hospital,” he pulls Changmin up from the ground gently, careful not the pull the injury, and lets the younger man lean on him. “A bullet wound would mean a police report, and we can’t afford that.”

 

Changmin whines, and Yunho cuts off his protest. “Look,” he almost shouts, refusing to look at the other as they make their way back to the truck, “this is what you wanted, isn’t it? You wanted to come on the big adventure, and this is what happens. Sometimes you get hurt, you bleed, and you know what? You pick yourself up and go on to the next one.” The high from the hunt is draining out of him in the face of Changmin’s distress, and it’s making him short tempered. But that’s not what Changmin needs right now, so Yunho reigns in the biting reproaches.

 

“I’m sorry,” he tries to soften his words, “but that’s how this gets played out. I can’t change the rules just because it’s you.” He finally turns his head to look for a reaction.

 

Changmin’s watching him carefully, like he’s waiting for Yunho to start really yelling, and Yunho flushes with regret but won’t take back the truth.

 

“C’mon,” he pulls Changmin a little closer and keeps moving towards the truck, thankful for the nearly empty street, “we need to get you cleaned up.”

 

Changmin follows silently.

 

\---

 

The guesthouse they found in Sokcho was decently priced. A little touristy, but with a parking space outside to make up for the bunk beds on the inside, tucked against the far wall. They had been hilarious at first, but after Yunho had nearly cracked his skull open trying fuck away some of their restless energy the night before, they became decidedly less funny, even if Changmin’s laughter might have proven otherwise.

 

Yunho wishes that Changmin were laughing now, but the younger man is lying on the bottom bunk on top of towels, still as stone as Yunho cleans the skin around the bullet. There’s no longer any blood, and the bullet made a clean entry. The piece of metal remained intact, but the heat from the firing may have fused it onto other vessels and muscle.

 

“It would be more dangerous to remove it,” he explained to Changmin, as he cleaned the wound, carefully sterilizing to prevent infection. Changmin just nodded and stared a the bed above him, mouth a thin line.

 

It takes less than an hour, and it looks like it will heal just fine. Yunho tries not to be too proud of his work, but he can’t help a little satisfaction. He’ll leave it open for a few days to drain, and only then will he think about adding the stitches.

 

He’s washing his hands in the tiny bathroom when he hears Changmin ask, “Is it always going to be like this?”

 

Sighing, he dries his hands on their only blood-free towel before going to sit next to Changmin on the cramped bed.

 

“Most of the time, yeah.” Yunho doesn’t bother to lie - Changmin already knows the answer. “But not always.”

 

Gingerly, Changmin shifts so he can stare at the older hunter. “We make a good team.” It’s not a question.

 

Yunho sighs, and scrubs his hand over his face. “We do, but it would be better if we sucked.”

 

“Why?”

 

“For all the reasons that we’ve been fighting about for the past year.” There’s no heat to the words, just calm acknowledgement. He flicks his gaze back to Changmin. “But it doesn’t really matter does it? If you’re still hell bent on all this even after tonight, then I can’t stop you.”

 

“I thought I wouldn’t,” Changmin admits, reaching out the pull on Yunho’s hand lying on the bed to trace along palm lines, “I was sure I was going to die when she pulled me into the alley, and then I wanted to when she locked me into her magic.” Changmin shudders slightly, eyes closing at the memory, and Yunho wraps their fingers together, ignoring the burning self consciousness at how easily Changmin pulls affection from him.

 

“But you still want to?” He pries.

 

“I do,” Changmin admits, “if that’s okay with you?” Yunho turns at the questioning tone, unused to anything but demanding confidence from the younger man when it comes to what he wants.

 

“That matters?” Yunho’s slightly baffled.

 

“Of course it matters!” Changmin struggles to sit up, wincing at the gauze covered injury, and Yunho helps him, “I don’t want this if it’s not with you.” He lifts one shoulder in an uncertain gesture face flushing, “So?”

 

“Well...” Yunho lets the sentence trail off, pretending like he really hasn’t already made the decision, like it hadn’t been made months and months ago when Changmin was the only person he trusted after Jitae died. Changmin scoffs and shoves lightly at Yunho’s chest, embarrassment coloring his face further and making Yunho laugh.

 

“We can figure this out,” Yunho assures him, moving closer, “but we’ll have to work at it.” Changmin beams and grabs at Yunho, pulling him a little too quickly. With a curse, Yunho falls forward, crushing Changmin underneath him, unable to completely avoid his bandaged side during the tumble.

 

“Jesus, fuck!” Changmin shouts, eyes screwed shut against the pain but shaking with half suppressed laughter.

 

“I said it would take some work!” Yunho protests, planting a kiss on Changmin’s nose, feeling relieved and more untroubled than he has in a long time.

 

It’s going to be difficult; Yunho’s not stupid. They’re different in approach and temper, and they already fight like cats and dogs without spending days on end trapped together in the cramped truck cab. He’ll worry about Changmin every single second of every single hunt, and it’s going to piss Changmin off to no end. But as they settle against each other on the twin mattress of the bottom bunk, too long legs locked together, Yunho runs his fingers soothingly up the younger man’s back and thinks it could be worth the all the impending nagging.

 

\---

 

_Time Passes_

 

“Duck!” Yunho shouts as he swings at the demon in front of him, distracting it while Changmin tucks and rolls to his left away from the metallic pillar pressing against his back. He hears the muffled thud of a shoulder smacking into the concrete floor of the abandoned warehouse and sees Changmin’s machete rock from his grasp and slide out of reach. Disquiet clenches tight in his chest, apprehensive of his partner’s vulnerability.

 

Yunho’s second of distraction gives the _guài_ a chance to turn on him, its red skin menacing in the harsh florescent light, no longer hidden by charms and glamor, and vile green eyes piercing as it claws through the air towards the hunter. Yunho swings his own machete, blade catching along the demon’s upper arm and pulling a stomach dropping yowl from the creature as it swings its apish long limbs, trying to catch him and tear him apart.

 

“Yunho!” Changmin snaps, springing from his crouch to charge the _guài_ , leading with his unbruised shoulder. It’s a brash and dangerous maneuver and Yunho would shout Changmin down if it weren’t so obviously effective. The _guài_ , still intent on Yunho, keels to the side from the force of Changmin’s 186 centimeters pummeling it into the floor.

 

It’s the first window they really get, and Yunho takes it without hesitation. In testament to their new team dynamic, Changmin rolls off the _guài_ immediately, no words exchanged, leaving Yunho with wide open space to arch the machete up and bring it swiftly down to settle in the _guài_ ’s neck with a soft, wet sound. It slices into the arteries and windpipe in a mess of blood, but the head remains attached.

 

The _guài_ chokes on death, each spasm pushing more blood from the wound as Yunho wrenches the blade from the demon’s body. Taking a couple of steadying breaths to gain equilibrium through the rush of success, Yunho turns to find Changmin.

 

Unfortunately, Changmin did not manage to move quite far enough away, and Yunho cringes at the blood smattered across his front, the younger man’s face and chest covered by the thick black spray.

 

“I’m going to kill you,” Changmin mutters threateningly, using the bottom of his shirt to wipe the stickiness from his face, and Yunho can’t stop the laughter that bursts from him at the sight of Changmin’s moping.

 

“Do you think I’m joking?” Changmin stands, grabbing his machete and waving it between them menacingly, which only serves to make Yunho laugh harder.

 

“Ten months of this shit,” Changmin mutters dropping the blade once more in the face of Yunho’s cackling and runs his fingers forlornly through his too-long hair, wincing when he finds more cooling blood trapped in the strands.

 

Yunho calms himself down and takes an admiring look at Changmin as the younger man rages at the stains on his clothes. The past few months have wrought changes on Changmin, hardening muscles and filling him out in a way that hours grading papers and doing research could never hope to accomplish even with regular trips to the gym. He’s grown in other ways too - in confidence and self possession, growing up even more while on the road with Yunho.

 

There are scars too, not nearly as many as he has, but Changmin’s acquiring a serious collection all his own. The initial bullet wound on his side; a gnarled mark running up the outside of a leg from a roc’s talon; and a smattering of smaller ones from knives and scrapes and breaking through glass panes.

 

Yunho would be a liar if he said he didn’t think it was hot as hell. The high from the hunt spurs into arousal as he looks at Changmin exhausted and covered in grime, but radiating energy and enthusiasm. Heat seeps through his veins and pounds through his head as he watches Changmin peel off the ruined shirt, giving Yunho a full view of his lithe, muscled frame.

 

Without bothering to question why the sight of Changmin bloody and sweaty turns him on, Yunho grabs at the other man and hauls him over to one of the metal pillars, pushing him against it and crowding close.

 

Yunho is already getting hard, and he’s pleased to find that Changmin is too, the thrill of a hunt building up the lust, twisting it higher as he hovers against Changmin and watches as his pupils dilate and breathing staccatos.

 

Changmin’s always been responsive, and Yunho relishes the opportunity to simultaneously unravel and rile up the man in front of him. He starts with a hot press of lips against his neck, mouth open for teeth and tongue.

 

He catches the bitter taste of the _guài_ on Changmin’s skin, but presses on to chase the breathy noises Changmin makes as he licks and bites his way up to his mouth, his own arousal buzzing beneath his skin as Changmin brushes fingers slowly along Yunho’s sides, before forcefully dragging his hips to press Changmin into the cement against his back.

 

Yunho moans softly against Changmin’s mouth at the friction, pressing forward again as he kisses him, tongue aggressive and greedy against Changmin’s own. He runs his hand up the inside of Changmin’s thigh and palms his erection light and teasing. Changmin jerks back, gasping, biting his lips to muffle the noises echoing through the hollow space of the warehouse. The bare concrete and metal skeleton magnify the sounds and echo the moans and gasps back at them. Yunho loves the way it twists through the air and wraps around them, and he wants to hear more.

 

“No, baby,” he cups Changmin’s face, and runs a thumb up his chin to the bitten lip, pulling at it gently until Changmin lets it go, breath hot against Yunho’s finger. “You know how much I love hearing you.” To prove his point, he rubs Changmin’s cock through the denim, and smiles at Changmin’s shout and how it pulls at his nerves. “That’s it.”

 

A thin sheen of sweat covers Changmin’s chest, and Yunho can’t stop himself from licking a slow path over sternum and neck, stopping to bite lightly at a strong jaw as he keeps the friction on Changmin’s cock just a little too light.

 

“Bastard,” Changmin curses, but Yunho just grins wickedly, and moves his hand to the waistband of Changmin’s jeans, fingers skimming beneath the top of the denim, tickling heated skin.

 

“Oh, God,” Changmin moans pulling at Yunho’s shirt and thrusting his hips forward, “Please.” As blunted fingernails scratch down his chest with impatience, Yunho stifles his own eager sounds to enjoy Changmin’s in stereo. He wallows in the heat rolling off the younger man’s body and basks in the flushed, dazed expression on Changmin’s face; seeing and hearing Changmin come apart underneath him has always been incredibly erotic to Yunho. He could get off from the sounds alone.

 

Yunho continues to slowly work his hand into Changmin’s jeans, leaving them done up, just pressing his palm against the hot length. His own breath is loud in his ears as he watches Changmin’s flush spread across his chest.

 

He doesn’t know how long he plays like this, too entranced by Changmin’s responses and clouded by his own arousal. But Changmin gets impatient and snarls, grabbing the front of Yunho’s shirt to haul him closer. Yunho’s hand stops it’s teasing, startled by the aggression. His dick seems to like it, swelling further at the rough handling, and Yunho shudders as Changmin leans forward slowly, breath noisy in Yunho’s ear as he presses closer.

 

“Yunho,” he warns, voice low and rough. “I am tired. I am covered in that thing’s blood. I am not in the mood for this.” Changmin grinds into Yunho forcefully, pulling a strangled groan from the older man's chest.

 

Changmin pauses for a moment before shoving Yunho away, nearly sending him to the ground. “In fact, we’re not doing this at all.”

 

Disappointment runs cold through Yunho, calming the roaring in his ears that had built up over the last few minutes. He still sounds dazed when he asks, “What?”

 

“We are not fucking against a cement pillar,” Changmin pulls Yunho by his wrist, walking backwards with an extra sway in his step. “Not with that still there,” he gestures with a tilt of his head to the crumpled body of the _guài_ , and, okay, that kills the edge of immediacy for Yunho.

 

“For once, we are going to go somewhere that I can spread out, and you can fuck me properly,” Changmin mutters, continuing toward the side entrance.

 

Yunho and his cock perk up at the mental picture of Changmin laid out underneath him. Oh yes, he thinks, imagining Changmin in the bed of the truck - one of his favorite fantasies. Lust flushes through him again at the thought, hot and sticky under his skin.

 

“Not in that tin can you call a truck,” Changmin sees right through him. Yunho sighs and plays it up with a forlorn look, and Changmin makes a noise of exasperation in the back of his throat. Changmin turns to press against Yunho, and whispers, “I’m thinking a real hotel. With those big fluffy quilts and giant glass showers.” Yunho’s mind does somersaults and triple axels, running away with the possibilities. Changmin spread out on pristine sheets; Changmin on his knees in the shower or trapped between Yunho and cold cold tile. Yes, definitely a hotel room.

 

Yunho moans, and Changmin takes it as a sign of victory, peeling himself off the other man and sliding out the warehouse door. Yunho takes a steadying breath and presses down harshly on his erection, willing it away and banishing the mental images his mind continues to conjure.

 

Neither effort works. Yunho shakes his head, trying to dislodge the buzz of arousal from the back of his mind, and hopes Changmin might be amenable to the possibility of road head.

 

Yunho doesn’t hold his breath and follows his partner out to the truck.


End file.
